


connect the dots

by taesbootae



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Roommates/Housemates, Fluff, Freckles, M/M, freckle kisses, i guess, in this house we love and adore marco’s freckles, it’s implied, let me be self-indulgent, no beta we die like my potential did in sixth grade, soft!jeanmarco
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-09
Updated: 2020-06-09
Packaged: 2021-03-04 05:27:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,371
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24628561
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/taesbootae/pseuds/taesbootae
Summary: jean has a pen. marco has freckles (and a crush).
Relationships: Marco Bott/Jean Kirstein
Comments: 3
Kudos: 44





	connect the dots

**Author's Note:**

> hello, first snk fic! i couldn’t stop thinking about jeanmarco, soft jean (bc marco’s already soft), and marco’s freckles. i accidentally opened a word doc and my hands slipped all over my keyboard. oops (〃 ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°〃ゞ
> 
> setting the scene: takes place in a roommate au (jean, marco, eren, connie) but that’s not super important, so you’re free to interpret whichever universe you please. jeanmarco are just chillin on the couch. five feet apart, and then no feet apart because they’re not straight. also, they’re OOC af. that is all. bone apple teeth (๑ゝڡ◕๑)─☆

Jean was staring.

Very obviously so, and not even bothering to hide the fact from Marco. But as much as Marco liked the undivided attention (and liked Jean), the latter’s plans tended to have a fifty-fifty chance of someone getting hurt or in trouble in some way, shape, or form. That, and the fact that Eren and Connie were out meant he _really_ wasn’t getting out of this one. He didn’t even have to _look_ at Jean to see the gears turning in his head. The freckled boy braces himself.

“Marco.” Marco hums to indicate his attention. “You have constellations on your face.”

“Do I?” Their eyes meet. Marco’s used to catching Jean’s gaze and then having him quickly turn away, but this time Jean didn’t even flinch. In fact, he wasn’t even looking at Marco. He was looking somewhere below Marco’s eyes, his pupils dancing freely across Marco’s cheeks as if he hadn’t just heard what the elder had said. The gears continued to turn, and the small smile playing on Jean’s lips gave him away.

“Can I—”

“No,” Marco deadpans. He already knows what the younger wants to ask. But Jean ignores him, nonetheless. Jean’s smile turns into a daunting Cheshire grin as he grabs a nearby pen and then looks up at the other. His eyes sparkle. Marco awaits his next move with bated breath.

“It won’t hurt. You just gotta stay still,” the younger says. If he was trying to be reassuring, it wasn’t working because the way he was heading towards Marco reminded him of his brother’s house cat stalking a still laser dot on the wall (Jean put his legs up on the couch and was doing a little walk on his knees towards Marco, pen in fist and determination in his eyes. It was intimidating, but Marco knew better than to run from a Jean with a plan).

“Ah! Wait—!”

It all happens so suddenly: Jean reaching Marco, Marco letting out an embarrassing noise of surprise, and Jean swiftly swinging a leg over Marco’s lap.

He was trapped.

Marco feels cold sweat go down his neck. But then the mischief in Jean’s grin ebbs away, revealing his innocence, his eyes crinkling in that special Jean way, and at that moment Marco was so endeared that he wished he had photographic memory so he could save that smile in his brain forever.

And that was the scariest part.

Jean pushes on Marco’s chest so that his back was fully on the couch and leans in close to examine his face. Marco is frozen in place with their proximity, but he still has half a mind to feel embarrassed and he finds himself blushing. Then his blushing makes him self-conscious, and all he wants now is for the couch to swallow him whole because his face is getting hotter by the second and Jean is _too close_ examining his fiery tomato face and—

“You’re hot.” Marco chokes on his spit. Jean puts a hand on one of his fiery tomato cheeks. Then on his forehead. Jean’s nose and brows crinkle in confusion when he finds that their temperatures don’t match. 

_Oh_ , Marco’s inner monologue mocks him, _he meant my_ temperature _was hot..._

“Stop that, it’s harder to see your freckles when your cute face looks like a Sriracha bottle.”

Marco runs out of things to choke on, so he ends up choking on air. His mouth opens and closes like a gaping fish as he tries to respond but ultimately no words come out. Jean’s smile turns soft, and he takes Marco’s chin in his left hand and gently eases his mouth closed so that Marco doesn’t have to. Then that same hand is moving to grip Marco’s right shoulder so he could steady himself and properly unleash his artistic vision.

“Don’t move okay?”

He can’t. Not after all that’s happened, Marco can’t. Jean hums triumphantly, taking Marco’s lack of response (and lack of regular breathing) as permission to let him do whatever he wants, and he gets to work.

Marco flinches when the cold, rounded tip of the pen makes contact with his right cheek. Jean’s not pressing too hard, so it just feels fluttery and ticklish, but Jean’s also very _physically close_ , so Marco’s stomach feels fluttery and ticklish as well. Jean’s grip on Marco’s shoulder tightens a bit when he finishes somewhere near Marco’s right ear, and Marco finds himself laying a hand on the younger’s left hip just in case he needs the extra support. Of course, Marco doesn’t miss the shade of pink Jean’s cheeks turn (literally and figuratively, all he could see was _Jean_ ), and he really wants to tease him about it; but Jean looks so concentrated with his tongue out and his furrowed brows that instead, Marco decides to save the image in his head with his best attempt at photographic memory.

Jean switches cheeks and unconsciously, Marco switches hands, too. Equilibrium, or something, right? Pixis’ Physics explanations are escaping his brain. ( _Everything_ escaped his brain the moment Jean sat beside him, really). Marco actually finds Jean’s sure, soft strokes kind of therapeutic now that he got used to it, and he was tempted to close his eyes for the full effect; but the need to save every second of this moment in his memory forced his eyes to stay open.

“And... done.”

Jean said it so softly that Marco could’ve missed it (he almost did, too focused on the other’s face and just barely catching the movement of lips in his periphery). Jean sits back, landing on Marco’s knees and Marco wants to pull him back, right in front of him where he was just a second ago because _no, that’s too far_ — but decides against it.

Their eyes meet. Jean’s gaze doesn’t pierce into his soul, so Marco doesn’t feel like running away, but it _is_ calculating, so Marco’s in a bit of a turmoil here.

“...I missed a spot.” Jean raises himself onto his knees again, he’s back in front of Marco’s face, and this time Jean’s hands are on both his shoulders. Jean leans forward like he’s going to draw again, but Marco sees no pen.

_Wait why didn’t he have a pen? Where’d it go? How was he supposed to draw without a drawing thing? What is—_

Jean leans in close. Close enough that Marco can smell the shampoo and soap he’d used that morning. He smelt like a mix of Connie and Eren, which Marco mentally frowned at because _he can use my stuff too_ , but all his thoughts are interrupted again when he realizes that Jean is close enough that he could kiss him.

But Jean decides to kiss him first. First on his right cheek, on the spot where he’d started on, then on his left cheek, where he’d finished off. Then Jean pulls away, Marco catching the hesitant glance below his nose, and feels a butterfly die in his stomach when Jean settles on his knees again — He’s still not too far, but still farther than Marco wants — and the younger gnaws at his own bottom lip.

“Thanks for letting me draw on you.”

Marco may be an idiot in love, but he wasn’t stupid. He could hear the wistfulness mixed with regret in Jean’s tone, feel Jean’s hands squeezing his shoulders like he doesn’t want to leave but now he’s shifting his weight and—

Marco sits up straight before Jean could get any further. He sits up straight so he could bring the proximity back, his nose to Jean’s nose. Marco uses his thumb to loosen the younger’s bottom lip from his teeth, and by luck the action ends up bringing Jean's face even closer.

“Is this okay? Tell me if it’s not.”

One beat. Two beats, and Jean nods. Three beats, and Marco takes his chance and this time _he’s_ the one kissing Jean and it’s on the lips.

 _Softer than expected_ , Marco notes when he’s kissed back. Not like he’d thought the other’s lips would feel like the Sahara Desert, just that it was _very_ soft. With a hint of apple, Marco couldn’t really tell.

(He just needed another minute or so to figure it out.)

**Author's Note:**

> thank you for reading! i can’t write chaptered fics for the life of me, so a oneshot it is. 
> 
> also if it seems a bit off, i wrote this like 2.5 years ago, but made some minor edits. so sorry if the style and quality is a bit weird (シ_ _)シ


End file.
